Is Chamath’s Biggest EV SPAC Investment Overhyped?? $ACTC

**Dave** (0:14)
Much like Oprah, Beyoncé and Elvis, the new world of investing has a handful of one-named superstars, Elon, Kathy and Chamath. Yes, I think Chamath Polyhaptea is the Elvis Presley of EV SPACs. Last week, he tweeted about his biggest investment in climate change, calling Proterra a no-brainer. And if you're like me, you've probably never heard of Proterra before his tweet. But they are the number one EV bus maker in North America, and they're going public in 2021, the 2021 way, as a SPAC under the ticker ACTC. If you watched the last few episodes of Dumb Money in the last couple of weeks, you know that we've made some big investments in some of these EV hype SPACs. Lion, Lightning and Lucid. Oh my. So obviously, we have to consider investing in Proterra. Today on Dumb Money, there is one question that we need to answer for ourselves.
Hey there, Dave here, along with Chris and Jordan, we are Dumb Money. Welcome to the show, SPAC-A-Palooza continuing today with Proterra. And thanks to the handy one-pager that Chamath tweeted, we know that the company says they've sold thousands of electric transit buses, 550 on the road today. Better system technology validated by 16 million miles. They've developed an industry-leading 54 megawatts of charging systems. Chris, Jordan, the real question, are you ready to jump on the hype bus?
Are you letting this one leave you at the terminal?

**Jordan** (1:53)
I just want you to say Chamath again.

**Dave** (1:56)
Chamath, Chamath.

**Jordan** (1:58)
No, it's Chamath, it's Chamath.

**Chris** (2:01)
Chamath, Chamath.

**Dave** (2:02)
It's Chamath, I believe.

**Chris** (2:03)
Chamath, Chamath.

**Dave** (2:04)
Chamath polyhaptia.

**Jordan** (2:05)
It's definitely not Chamath. I know that real good.

**Dave** (2:08)
Here, I'm going to say it a bunch of different ways, and then I'll just edit in the right one. Chamath, Chamath, Chamath, Chamath.
Chamil, Chamil.

**Chris** (2:17)
I think we need to remind everyone why it is that we're talking about bus companies every day. You know, we have the inauguration coming up tomorrow.
The Green Energy Initiative, Biden's Green Energy Initiative, a big part of it is essentially mandating that every commercial vehicle, it seems like, but specifically commercial buses, including school buses, but all buses, kind of go electric by 2030 I mean, that's a monster mandate right there, right?
The bus industry is just absolutely enormous, and there aren't 100 companies manufacturing buses. So, Lion was kind of our big Canadian EV bus manufacturer that we got in. I want to say we got in like midway along the hype train online, right? We probably are a little guilty for adding to that hype train.

**Dave** (3:06)
A little late, I would say. By the time the show ended, and I was considering getting my trade in, I thought that that was too expensive, but you already had put a million dollars for yourself.

**Chris** (3:16)
Well, it did go up another 50 It did go up about another 50% after I put the million dollars in.

**Dave** (3:22)
I know.

**Chris** (3:23)
So we weren't too late. You just weren't aggressive enough getting your order in.

**Dave** (3:27)
Clearly.

**Chris** (3:28)
And then also, listen, Lightning E-Motors, one of my absolute favorite EV, commercial EV truck specs, but with the worst naming and website.

**Dave** (3:39)
The worst naming website in history.

**Jordan** (3:41)
I think they're doing a new website. I think, didn't I see a tweet where there was like this guy and he's got his graphic design card?
So I think we might have inspired that.

**Chris** (3:49)
They're working on it. You know, the great thing about Lightning E-Motors, partially because of the name and the website, is they're not as hype. You know, they weren't on Kramer like Lion was the day after our show.
They haven't run through that cycle, but it's hard to find a bigger hype engine than Chamath, okay? You too.

**Dave** (4:09)
You've got the same syndrome as me.

**Chris** (4:12)
Yeah, so I had it right, now you confuse me. There's no one that the market pays more attention to than him. So you really have to ask yourself prior to getting in. I'm in, guys. I'm not in as heavy as I am lion, or as heavy as I am lightning, but I'm in. I got in maybe a week, week and a half ago.
But you have to ask yourself, is it over? I mean, at what point does the information parity hit in? Because we're all about investing when there's an information imbalance, meaning you identify some information the market doesn't fully appreciate. When that kind of hits parity, that's when you exit the trade. So with Chamath in this deal, could you really say that there's information imbalance left? Because doesn't everyone just assume that if he's invested in it, it's a golden company and people overbuy?